Oct. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Shortly after the U.S. government
shutdown ended, President Barack Obama declared that he wanted
immigration legislation back on Congress’s agenda, with the goal
of passage by year’s end. Some fellow Democrats are in no hurry.

Their concern: a compromise with Republicans might take the
edge off an issue that tops the agenda for Hispanics, a group
that gave Obama 71 percent of its votes in the 2012 presidential
election. Democrats want to hold onto that decisive margin in
their bid to keep control of the U.S. Senate and win a House
majority in next year’s congressional races.

“There are some Democrats who would rather get it done --
and others who would rather have the issue” linger, said Tamar
Jacoby, president of ImmigrationWorks USA, a network of business
groups that promotes legal immigration. “Either way, they
win,” said Jacoby, who has spoken with many Democratic
lawmakers. “I hope Obama wants a bill.”

The reluctance of some Democrats to press the issue now is
only one of the hurdles facing legislation this year. A majority
of House Republicans oppose providing a pathway to citizenship
for undocumented workers. And a White House-backed push by pro-immigration groups -- including high-technology companies eager
to obtain visas for workers -- was derailed by the 16-day
government shutdown and fight over the debt limit.

That confrontation, some Republicans say, further poisoned
the president’s relations with the party.

‘No Discussion’

“There’s no discussion about immigration” by either
party, said Texas Republican John Carter, who last month left a
bipartisan House group that was working on a bill. “I have a
heart for fixing immigration, but not sure the will is there.”

With the fiscal crisis temporarily resolved, the president
has been forced to focus on fixing website failures on his
health-care law, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Speaking to reporters at the White House today, spokesman
Jay Carney said the questions surrounding the health-care law
shouldn’t hold up progress on immigration. “There’s no
connection between the Affordable Care Act and comprehensive
immigration reform,” he said.

Obama this morning urged Congress to approve legislation,
casting the bill as a way to boost the U.S. economy.

“We should pass immigration reform,” the president said
at a White House event. “It’s good for our economy, it’s good
for our national security, it’s good for our people, and we
should do it this year.”

Political Repercussions

He hinted of political repercussions to come for
Republicans who prevent legislation from moving forward.

“Anyone still standing in the way of this bipartisan
reform should at least have to explain why,” he said. “It’s up
to Republicans in the House to decide if reform becomes a
reality or not.”

The fate of the legislation rests largely in the hands of
House Speaker John Boehner, an Ohio Republican, who must decide
whether to bring a bill to the full House.

The Senate in June passed an immigration bill on a
bipartisan vote that included a path to citizenship for the
country’s estimated 11 million undocumented workers.

Supporters of immigration legislation say if Obama pushes
hard, it might make it tougher for Republicans to support a
priority of the Democratic administration.

“If he leans into it too aggressively, it makes it harder
for Republicans to get to ‘yes,’” said Frank Sharry, executive
director of Washington-based America’s Voice. “He wants a
result so badly that he’s willing to step back so Republicans
can step forward.”

Immigration First

The president has no nationwide barnstorming tour scheduled
to promote the issue, according to administration officials, who
asked for anonymity to discuss internal strategy.

In remarks after the partial government shutdown ended last
week, Obama listed immigration first among three legislative
priorities, along with action on the budget and passage of a
farm bill.

He then scolded the same Republican lawmakers whose votes
he’ll need for the House to approve Senate-passed legislation.

“There are folks on the other side who think that my
policies are misguided,” he said. “We shouldn’t fail to act on
areas that we do agree or could agree just because we don’t
think it’s good politics, just because the extremes in our party
don’t like the word ‘compromise.’”

‘Same People’

Democrats say Republicans will suffer politically if they
fail to move a bill forward. “We are going to hold Republicans
accountable for everything: the bad things they do and the good
things that they don’t do,” said Representative Steve Israel of
New York, chairman of the House Democratic campaign committee.

Should Republicans block legislation, that would create an
opening for Democrats to paint them as obstructionists, say some
lawmakers, who argue that Republican opposition to a bill could
be paired with the party’s role in the government shutdown.

“The same people who caused the government shutdown and
stopped us from opening the government for two and a half weeks
are the people who are blocking immigration reform,” said
Representative Joaquin Castro, a Texas Democrat.

While House Republican leaders have expressed interest in
moving forward with legislation, many party lawmakers say
Obama’s decision not to negotiate over the shutdown and debt
ceiling has soured relations.

Speaking on “Fox News Sunday,” Senator Marco Rubio, a
Florida Republican, said the president’s tactics undermined his
efforts to build a consensus.

Limited Window

“Now, this notion that they’re going to get in a room and
negotiate a deal with the president on immigration is much more
difficult to do,” Rubio said in the Oct. 20 interview,
“because of the way that president has behaved towards his
opponents over the last few weeks.”

Advocates for an immigration overhaul, including Jacoby,
see a limited congressional window for movement on comprehensive
legislation, possibly limited to the next several weeks before
new fiscal deadlines hit in the coming months.

Some Democrats have hinted that action could come further
in the future, possibly in the early summer after primary
election filing deadlines are past. Then, they say, Republicans
will begin turning their focus to the general election, making
them more eager to take up the legislation as a way to woo
Hispanic voters in battleground states such as Florida, Nevada
and Colorado.

“I’m going to do everything I can to get it done this
year,” Senate Majority leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat,
told Univision television on Oct. 18. “But remember this is a
two-year Congress.”

Coalition Lobbies

A coalition of business groups, religious leaders and
agricultural companies has spent much of the year lobbying for
legislation. Next week, the Partnership for a New American
Economy, an association of mayors and business leaders, is
flying in 400 business, religious and technology leaders to make
the case for a bill on Capitol Hill. They’re targeting House
Republicans from more than 20 states.

Anti-tax activist Grover Norquist, the American Farm
Bureau, the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious
Liberty Commission, FWD.US, an advocacy group co-founded by
Facebook Inc. Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg, and the
U.S. Chamber of Commerce will join them for a rally in urging
Republicans to take action.

The Partnership for a New American Economy was formed by
Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the founder and majority owner of
Bloomberg News parent Bloomberg LP.

‘Conservative Movement’

“The goal is to say. ‘Look, this is the conservative
movement,’” said Jeremy Robbins, director of the Partnership
for a New American Economy. “This is good for the economy, it’s
good for America and it’s good for the party.”

Boehner has said the House won’t back the Senate bill and
instead will take action on smaller-scale measures. Speaking to
reporters in Washington yesterday, he said he’s still hopeful
the House will move on legislation. Senate leaders say they
won’t support scaled-down bills.

The House Judiciary Committee has approved legislation
dealing with enforcement, employment verification, and
agricultural and high-skilled workers.

California Republican Darrell Issa, the chairman of the
House Oversight panel, is working on a proposal that would offer
temporary legal status to qualifying undocumented immigrants,
according to spokesman Frederick Hill.

Lawmakers will also need to shift to the budget as
deadlines approach in December, January and February for funding
the government and raising the debt ceiling. Representative Tom
Cole, an Oklahoma Republican, said an immigration revamp is
“dead” until Democrats and Republicans resolve those issues.

The bitterness left over from the recent budget battle will
be hard to overcome, say some lawmakers.

“He’s tried to destroy the Republican Party,”
Representative Raul Labrador, an Idaho Republican, said of
Obama, at a forum of Republicans on Oct. 16. “Anything we do
right now with this president on immigration will be with that
same goal in mind, which is to destroy the Republican Party and
not to get good policies.”